Strange military vehicle

biko

"So, what's the most unusual military vehicle you can think of? Maybe the Japanese airplane-launching submarine of WW2? Or perhaps the Soviet attempts to build a flying tank? Or perhaps the 1000 ton rolling fortress the Germans tried to build in WW2? All quite odd, I agree, but barely made it past the drawing boards. The oddest is a scooter armed with a 75mm cannon.

After World War II, there was little money for defense spending while the nations of Europe rebuilt their industry and society. When there was some cash to spend, one had to be creative to stretch it as far as possible. The French probably accomplished the most astounding example of that with the ACMA Troupes Aeról Portées Mle. 56. Deployed with their airborne forces, this was essentially a militarized Vespa scooter outfitted with a 75mm recoilless rifle. Five parachutes would carry the two-man gun crew, weapon, ammunition, and two scooters safely to earth, and the men would load the weapon on one scooter and the ammo on the other, then ride away. More impressively, the recoilless rifle could be fired effectively on the move by the best of the gun crews. Total cost? About $500 for the scooter and the recoilless rifle was war surplus. Were they successful military machines? Well, the French Army deployed about 800 armed scooters in wars conducted in both Algeria and Indochina."

Apparently, recoil was not a problem whatsoever, and this little scooter could (and did) wreak serious havoc.

silverharp

biko wrote:

Or perhaps the 1000 ton rolling fortress the Germans tried to build in WW2?

Any links for that? never heard of it before

did the brits have a proposal to build aircraft carriers out of ice bergs in WW2?

TerrorFirmer

silverharp wrote:

Any links for that? never heard of it before

did the brits have a proposal to build aircraft carriers out of ice bergs in WW2?

I didn't hear about actual aircraft carriers mind but there were exploratory ideas in landing strips created out of ice. As for this scooter, I've never heard of it..until now, that is. Quite comical, and to imagine it being fired on the move...:p

GreenHell

Imagine the embarrassment of been taken out of action by a vespa, that probably why you never heard of it.

Alkers

Doesn't look like it's easy to change the elevation?
I'd like to see it being fired on the move!
Those "aircraft carriers made of ice" were going to be made out of pykrete.
Heres a video:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/235665/2_million_ton_pykrete_aircraft_carrier_in_ww2/

RedPlanet

Sure they even had Panzerfaust (anti-tank guns) mounted on bicycles.
Those crazy krauts.

bus77

I remember playing a mod for Battlefild 1942 with one of them in it. Did'nt know it was real
There was also a big mechanical spider btw, that ring any bells for anyone?

biko

GreenHell wrote:

Imagine the embarrassment of been taken out of action by a vespa, that probably why you never heard of it.

Sir, we were taken out by a Ve... err... hmm... biiiig tank

parliament

silverharp wrote:

Any links for that? never heard of it before

did the brits have a proposal to build aircraft carriers out of ice bergs in WW2?

its called pykrete, a mixture of ice and sawdust

Manic Moran

If you're interested, it's an M20 75mm recoilless rifle, of WWII vintage.

Anything the Vietnamese can do, the Americans can do better.



6x 106mm

NTM

tallus

Manic Moran wrote:

If you're interested, it's an M20 75mm recoilless rifle, of WWII vintage.

Anything the Vietnamese can do, the Americans can do better.



6x 106mm

NTM

Jaysus I'd hate to be on the recieving end of a salvo from that thing !

Pyr0

Ha exactly what I was thinking, a bit over powerd no ?

Manic Moran

Well, you have to remember that it can't be reloaded from inside the vehicle. It's basically a six-shooter: Take your six shots, with whatever rounds happen to be loaded (APERS, HEAT, whateveR), and that's it.

NTM

magick

how about this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-28_Super_Heavy_Tank

Manic Moran

The most interesting thing about that tank is the fact that though it's the heaviest armoured vehicle the US ever built, they managed to lose it in a Virginia forest for about twenty years.

Prototype's sitting in Ft Knox, it's not quite as big as you would think.

Russians came up with a smilar one post-war.
Objekt 279 (For snowy or marshy terrain). One example exists.


Other interesting Russian inventions are the Tsar tank of 1915 of which no example survives,


And my personal favourite, the KT-60 (A-40) Glider Tank. When the West created the Tetrarch and M22 Locust airborne tanks, they created the Hamilcar glider to transport them.

M-22 shown here)

The Russians thought about that for a second, and decided "Why make a glider to carry a tank? Why not just the tank into a glider?"

So they strapped wings to a T-60 light tank, and towed it behind a TB-3 bomber.

Only ever made one attempt at a flight: The TB-3 didn't have the horsepower to keep the somewhat unaerodynamic contraption airborne. Apparently it flew quite well, for as long as it stayed up. After landing, it jettisoned the wings, and drove back to base.

NTM

Dub13

Manic Moran wrote:

The most interesting thing about that tank is the fact that though it's the heaviest armoured vehicle the US ever built, they managed to lose it in a Virginia forest for about twenty years.

LOL....any more detail's on this...?

Victor

tallus wrote:

Jaysus I'd hate to be on the recieving end of a salvo from that thing !

Standing behind it wasn't much safer.

Manic Moran

Dub13 wrote:

LOL....any more detail's on this...?

Not many. I've absolutely no idea how they managed to lose a 90-ton-assault gun, indeed, both had been reported as having been scrapped and destroyed. Then in the 1980s, some 40 years later (Not the 20 I originally, off-the-cuff recalled), some bloke in Virginia found this massive rusting hulk in the woods. Was brought to the Patton museum in Kentucky and cosmetically restored.

See here: http://johnsmilitaryhistory.com/armort28.html

NTM

jmayo

What about the little German half track with motorbike front wheel,
SdKfz 2 or short Kettenkrad.
Can't imagine what it woud be like to drive, saw one in museum in Vienna.
Actually not big at all, very narrow just room for few guys on back.

marcsignal

Dunno how this thing got off the ground but was used for recon on the eastern front

Manic Moran

Found an earlier prototype for the vehicle in the original post.



Also a later version



NTM

Lazairus

Wtf
????

Clare gunner

Or perhaps the 1000 ton rolling fortress the Germans tried to build in WW2?

Think you mean the Maus[Mouse] tank? It was more like 150 tons.A Porsche design,with twin guns mounted in the Turret.It was a disaster from the word go.It was so big that it couldnt be rail transported.It tore up all the roads it travelled on,it vibrated building foundations apart.Used up huge amounts of vital war material in construction.Got stuck in everything ,bar the most driest ground,and was dead slow as well.Only three were ever built.

Clare gunner

[

QUOTE=Manic Moran]Found an earlier prototype for the vehicle in the original post.

I feel a Spike Milligan moment coming on here.:D

Capt'n Midnight

Clare gunner wrote:

Think you mean the Maus[Mouse] tank? It was more like 150 tons.A Porsche design,with twin guns mounted in the Turret.It was a disaster from the word go.

Was very very slow cross country too.
No there were designs using U-Boat diesels ( 3 of them ?) for a very large tank but never got off the drawing boards.

Wouldn't have worked either, the allies after D-day were in a position to point radar at cross roads to and launch artillery strikes. They also had liberators with radar used against submarines in the atlantic and against japanese shipping in the pacific. So it would have been nailed pdq.



Not vehicles but..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Peacock - Chicken powered atomic bomb.

I'll dig up the link to the anti-submarine weapon whose lethal radius was greater than it's range.

http://www.luft46.com - many of you know about this already

marcsignal

heinkle he 111z ( z is for zwilling or twin )

Kaiser_Sma

follow up on the 1000ton tank the Landkreuzer P.1000 Ratte

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight

Thre is the M520 amphibious truck


Anyone find those really really large amphibians the US had ?

Capt'n Midnight

LARC-60 (4x4) 60-ton Amphibious Cargo Carrier US http://tanxheaven.com/larc60/larc60.htm



one for sale her http://www.warehamsteamship.com/larc-lx.htm But it's pink

biko

Big Bertha 2 http://crazylinkz.blogspot.com/2007/02/worlds-most-impressive-gun.html

Schwerer Gustav and Dora were the names under which the German(world war 2) 80 cm K railway guns were known. They were developed in the late 1930s by Krupp in order tSchwerer Gustav and Dorao destroy large, heavily fortified targets.Krupp built a test model in late 1939 and sent it to the Hillersleben firing range for testing. Penetration was tested on this occasion. Firing almost vertically, the gun was able to penetrate the specified 7 meters of concrete and 1 meter of armour plate.The ammunition for the gun consisted of a heavy concrete-piercing shell and a lighter higSchwerer Gustav and Dorah-explosive shell. A super-long-range rocket projectile was also planned with a range of 150 km that would require the barrel being extended to 84 m. This rocket projectile would have enabled the bombardment of England.
In keeping with the tradition of the Krupp company, no charge was made for the first gun. However, they did charge 7 million Reichsmark for the second gun Dora, named after the senior engineer's wife.Designed in preparation for World War II, they were intended to be used against the Maginot Line. But instead of a frontal assault, the Wehrmacht outflanked the line during the Battle of France. One of the guns was used in Russia at the siege of Sevastopol during Operation Barbarossa. It was destroyed near the end of the war to avoid capture.

Victor

Kaiser_Sma wrote:

follow up on the 1000ton tank the Landkreuzer P.1000 Ratte

Surely an assault gun, not a tank.

Leadership

Cool old thread, time to bring it alive.

Here is a modern one, not as cool as a Scooter with a gun but still odd. Its the Terrier.



Here is its predecessor the CET or "Frog" as we used to call it

IRISH RAIL

I have a pic from one of the IDF museams of a mock up merkava
basicily what it was imaging the shape of a tank cut out and welded onto a merkava mk2 only thing was this was about 5 times th size of the original,
I had to stand way outside the pavillion just to get the whole thing in I swear it was a sewerage pipe they had in place of a barrel. there was a story behind it that anyone who saw this thing coming and stayed to fight it was crazy.
as soon as i figure out how to post a pic up i will do.
have some other pics of various Israeli ingenuity from the war of independance and other conflicts will put them up aswell.

minidazzler

IRISH RAIL wrote: »

I have a pic from one of the IDF museams of a mock up merkava
basicily what it was imaging the shape of a tank cut out and welded onto a merkava mk2 only thing was this was about 5 times th size of the original,
I had to stand way outside the pavillion just to get the whole thing in I swear it was a sewerage pipe they had in place of a barrel. there was a story behind it that anyone who saw this thing coming and stayed to fight it was crazy.
as soon as i figure out how to post a pic up i will do.
have some other pics of various Israeli ingenuity from the war of independance and other conflicts will put them up aswell.

Go to Photobucket and upload them, when uploaded just give the links!!! I wanna see these!!!

Capt'n Midnight

The nuclear-only Mk-45 ASTOR (Anti-Submarine Torpedo) onboard the USS Greenfish (SS-351) carried a W34 warhead with a yield of 10-15 kilotons. The weapon was wire-guided and had a range of 10-12 miles. These factors gave rise to the joke that ASTOR had a "kill probability" of two: its target and its launcher.

Capt'n Midnight

Leadership wrote:

Here is its predecessor the CET or "Frog" as we used to call it

very odd machine, it was just about the only amphibious bulldozer

Loveless

Soviet ekranoplan, flying hovercraft built during Cold War. Nicknamed the Caspian Sea Monster.



"Ground effect aircraft use the extra lift of their large wings when in proximity to the surface (about one to four meters). It is also interesting to note that this aircraft is one of the largest ever built, with a length of 73m, rivaling that of the Hughes H-4 Hercules "Spruce Goose" and many modern jumbo jets."

"The aircraft was equipped for anti-submarine warfare. It was therefore fitted with six missile launchers, mounted in pairs on the dorsal surface of the fuselage, and advanced tracking systems mounted in the nose and tail. A development of the Lun was planned for use as a mobile field hospital, one which could be rapidly deployed to any ocean or coastal location."

Leadership

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

very odd machine, it was just about the only amphibious bulldozer

The amphibious element was a bit of a joke, it took 8 hours to seal the hull and attach huge floats to it. Once in the water only 6 inches of the tank was out of the water. Once in the water it handled very well and was quite fast.

Manic Moran

Loveless wrote: »

"The aircraft was equipped for anti-submarine warfare. It was therefore fitted with six missile launchers, mounted in pairs on the dorsal surface of the fuselage, and advanced tracking systems mounted in the nose and tail.

Anti-surface warfare.



Those are SS-N-22 launchers, Sunburns. Same as found on the Sovremennyy anti-ship/anti-air destroyer.

NTM

IRISH RAIL

I remember seeing that on discoverys planes that never flew
kruschev said in the un "we have boats that can jump bridges"
really interesting about it the designer was watched more than the plane,
when kruschev went the project was scrapped and the us only found it by chance when a aerial intelligence oficer noticed huge wings at a submarine base.

will try and sort a photo bucket account later and post the liks

Capt'n Midnight

the problem with the ekranoplanes was starting
you needed a lot more engines to get into the air than you used to cruise something like 4:1

ideal for assults too , forget about hovercraft with one of these you could could zip across the beach at 400 mph

Capt'n Midnight

Mil Mi-12

Capt'n Midnight

And now a picture of a smaller Russian 'copter

Mil Mi-26 recovering an American CH-47 Chinook helicopter








As a flying test rig, the XH-17 utilized as many existing parts as possible,
including a cockpit from a Waco CG-15 glider,
landing gear from both a B-25 & C-54, and a bomb-bay fuel tank from a B-29.
A pair of General Electric J35 jet engines were modified
to route bleed air into the 130 foot 2-blade rotor,
where the air was mixed with fuel at the rotor tips in 4 burners.
With the giant rotor turning at only 88 rpm,
the engines & pressure-jets were expected to produce 3,480 hp.

biko

biko wrote: »

Big Bertha 2 http://crazylinkz.blogspot.com/2007/02/worlds-most-impressive-gun.html

Schwerer Gustav and Dora were the names under which the German(world war 2) 80 cm K railway guns were known. They were developed in the late 1930s by Krupp in order tSchwerer Gustav and Dorao destroy large, heavily fortified targets.Krupp built a test model in late 1939 and sent it to the Hillersleben firing range for testing. Penetration was tested on this occasion. Firing almost vertically, the gun was able to penetrate the specified 7 meters of concrete and 1 meter of armour plate.The ammunition for the gun consisted of a heavy concrete-piercing shell and a lighter higSchwerer Gustav and Dorah-explosive shell. A super-long-range rocket projectile was also planned with a range of 150 km that would require the barrel being extended to 84 m. This rocket projectile would have enabled the bombardment of England.
In keeping with the tradition of the Krupp company, no charge was made for the first gun. However, they did charge 7 million Reichsmark for the second gun Dora, named after the senior engineer's wife.Designed in preparation for World War II, they were intended to be used against the Maginot Line. But instead of a frontal assault, the Wehrmacht outflanked the line during the Battle of France. One of the guns was used in Russia at the siege of Sevastopol during Operation Barbarossa. It was destroyed near the end of the war to avoid capture.

thats nothing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Babylon

IRISH RAIL

yes project babylon but what happened to mr bull ????

Duffers

Wow! There's some wierd sh*t out there!

What about this...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleeping_Beauty_(canoe)

The submersible canoe.

IRISH RAIL

seen that canoe on discovery aswell though the show i cant remember
was really a good idea in principle.

peasant

How about the Kraka ?





a foldable platform carrier for the German airborne troups, equipped with a 26 hp 700 cc BMW engine. About 900 of them were built.

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight

http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2007/11/strange-tanks-part-2.html